Is Organic Baby Food Really Any Good?

Being a mom is never easy, especially when it comes to deciding about organic baby food or any of the other choices out there. A lot is today being written about the right kind of food for your baby. But despite all the confusion out there, just what is best for your child?

Here are a few facts to help you decide.

Background Phase 1

Babies are introduced to solid foods in stages. The first stage is usually some kind of baby cereal. Cereal is light and made with baby’s milk. Because of their plain consistency, most cereals don’t pose the risk of food allergy that other foods do.

Background Phase 2

When your baby is ready to move past the cereal stage, s/he moves into strained baby food terrain. This can be found in the cute little jars on shelves in every grocery store – Gerber baby food is one such well-known brand. The strained vegetables and fruits look like part of a elderly diet, but remember babies have no teeth so they have no complaints.

Background Phase 3

Next come baby foods with a thicker consistency. The only way most of us can tell the turkey from the chicken is by the label and sometimes the smell. There again, baby doesn’t seem to mind, it’s something a little bit different and variety is good.

Background Phase 4

The last stage is the chunky jarred foods.  These contain pieces of meat and vegetables that babies with some teeth can chew and swallow.  A child that is a year old or more can handle this pretty well.

Now that we have the stages down pat, let’s go to organic baby foods. 

Organic foods are farmed naturally with no pesticides or other chemicals used during farming. Organic meats come from animals that have been farm raised on feed and without the use of antibiotics or steroids that are most often used nowadays.

The biggest concern of the majority of parents about regular baby food is the ingredients added during processing.

In a perfect world, baby food would be all natural, but some processing has to be done to keep the product edible after several months on the store shelf. In plain terms this simply means that food manufacturers must prolong the shelf life by adding some kind of preservative.

Stores offer these organic baby foods, but usually they are more expensive and still have gone through some processing, although dramatically less than “ordinary” baby foods.

Some parents are suspicious enough to resort to homemade baby foods using organic fruits and vegetables. This is great and there is absolutely nothing wrong with this. They get the peace of mind knowing what is in their baby’s food and baby gets the natural taste of a whole host of fresh foods. 

Other parents have decided that baby will in any case at some stage be exposed to the possibility of pesticides during their childhood… and probably sooner rather than later. 

Reality shows that these folks may buy jarred organic baby food or they may not. Most often if they don’t, they trust that the government guidelines for commercially grown food are being adhered to and that their baby’s food is safe. The decision exclusively depends on the parents.

The truth of the matter is this…

The majority of commercial baby foods are not truly “organic”.

These days the only real organic baby food is that which parents make themselves. And then only with the necessary care and precaution. 

The reality is that your baby will shortly run into processed foods. So, depending on how safe or unsafe you believe baby’s food is or isn’t, it is up to you and the research you have done to determine the right choice of regular or organic baby food for your baby.

Personally I believe that the guidelines and legislation imposed on baby food manufacturers are so strict that chances of harmful mistakes or slipups are very slim.

Bottom line is this, I am practical and thus go with what is easiest and most convenient... and that's usually commercial baby food.

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